John Ward’s ‘The Big Eco-Con’ Blog – A Response

On Tuesday, 14th August, John Ward published a blog, The Big Eco-Con, which requires a response to the lack of insight. The text below in italics are quotes from Mr Ward’s blog and my responses follow each quote.

Thankfully, the (mostly) myth surrounding the notion of ‘man-made global warming’ has been realised – especially when its title had to be amended to ‘climate change’ as a catch-all – and then it was discovered that, in secret, the Bilderbergers were now looking at global cooling as a very real phenomenon.

With this statement, Mr Ward shows he has not understood either the issue or the terminology.

“Climate change is a moral issue of unprecedented scope, a matter of intergenerational injustice, as today’s adults obtain benefits of fossil fuel use, while consequences are felt mainly by young people and future generations.”James Hansen, Director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York City and Adjunct Professor of Earth Sciences at Columbia University’s Earth Institute.

“Given what we know now, it is simply unethical to impose risk of grave damage on future generations just so that we can have a few more consumer products today. The only ethical path is to stop using the atmosphere as a waste dump for greenhouse gas pollution.”

“As a political strategy, are we supposed to believe that somehow atmospheric CO2 concentrations will be lower in the future if today we expand fossil fuel industries that rely on using the atmosphere as a waste dump? Am I really supposed to persuaded that the path to lower future CO2 concentrations is by building more power plants with smokestacks that dump CO2 into the atmosphere?”

With regards to the terminology, global warming is an overall warming of the planet, based on average temperature over the entire surface; climate change, however, relates to changes in regional climate characteristics, including temperature, humidity, rainfall, wind, and severe weather events. In March 2011, I wrote a short blog about the use of the two terms.

Then the eco-fascists around the world, including our own Green party, were staunchly against nuclear power. Why? It can’t be because of radiation, surely.

In May 2010, I wrote a Nuclear Power – Unwanted and Unnecessary series of blogs and they address Mr Ward’s statement: part one followed on from my blog concerning the impacts of mining nuclear fuel and covered the consequences of the Chernobyl nuclear accident; part two covered health and waste issues; part three covered fourth generation nuclear reactors; and part four covered how nuclear power cannot play a significant role in the reduction of CO2 and how energy efficiency and renewables can supply the answer.

Indeed, coal-fired power stations are at least as ‘dangerous’ in this respect, and almost certainly more so: they certainly are in America, as OMG Facts explains (with a link to the source of this information).

The Greens also have a real thing about wind turbines – but that is no solution either. The figures that came out earlier this month showed that Britain’s wind turbines are between them currently providing well under a thousandth of the nation’s needs (0.03%).

A March 2011 blog, There is More to Renewables Than Just Wind, opened with the statement “There does seem to be a feeling amongst some politicians and members of the public that wind is the only source of renewable energy – last week’s (17th March) Question Time was a good example of this – leading to the conclusion that renewables are not diverse sources of energy.” The blog then summarised the sources of renewable energy, which are:

Of course, the whole idea of the Greens, as an essentially Communist-style party, was to find and expand a lever they can pull in order to have dominion over the rest of us. This is why almost their entire core policy platform involves sticks rather than carrots: additional taxes, regulations, penalties and other impositions.

This approach is typical of Mr Ward: he uses sweeping statements, along with what some people may consider provocative words (e.g. “Communist”), without providing support for his arguments. These are the core values of the Green Party and they form part of our Policies for a Sustainable Society:

Humankind depends on the diversity of the natural world for its existence. We do not believe that other species are expendable.

The Earth’s physical resources are finite. We threaten our future if we try to live beyond those means, so we must build a sustainable society that guarantees our long-term future.

Every person, in this and future generations, should be entitled to basic material security as of right.

Our actions should take account of the well-being of other nations, other species, and future generations. We should not pursue our well-being to the detriment of theirs.

A healthy society is based on voluntary co-operation between empowered individuals in a democratic society, free from discrimination whether based on race, colour, gender, sexual orientation, religion, social origin or any other prejudice.

We emphasise democratic participation and accountability by ensuring that decisions are taken at the closest practical level to those affected by them.

We look for non-violent solutions to conflict situations, which take into account the interests of minorities and future generations in order to achieve lasting settlements.

The success of a society cannot be measured by narrow economic indicators, but should take account of factors affecting the quality of life for all people: personal freedom, social equity, health, happiness and human fulfilment.

Electoral politics is not the only way to achieve change in society, and we will use a variety of methods to help effect change, providing those methods do not conflict with our other core principles.

The Green Party puts changes in both values and lifestyles at the heart of the radical green agenda.

Green politics is not about “left”, “right”, “socialism”, etc.; Green politics is about understanding and believing we depend on the diversity of the natural world for our existence, that other species are not expendable, and that all human activities must be indefinitely sustainable (i.e. we must neither use resources faster than they can be replaced nor create effects or products which cannot be assimilated harmlessly and indefinitely by the environment).

Finally, Mr Ward refers to a programme in which the presenter, Iain Dale, and members of the public put questions to the Green Party leadership contenders and, at the time of writing (15th August), the programme is available online.

6 Responses to “John Ward’s ‘The Big Eco-Con’ Blog – A Response”

Today I remembered an article I read in June concerning research which estimated that the generating capacity at European nuclear and coal-fired plants (which rely on consistent volumes of water flow at particular temperatures to cool overheated turbines) will fall, due to climate change, 6% to 19% from 2031 to 2060 because of a lack of cooling water. The study also concluded that, “extreme” drops in power generation caused by near or total plant shutdowns will triple during that time period.http://e360.yale.edu/digest/power_plant_production_drops_as_waters_warm_and_river_flows_decline/3492/